Keeping Your Horse Healthy While Protecting Your Sanity

There are very few opportunities for self analysis better than owning or working with horses. If you will pay attention to what you are doing, the horse can tell you a lot about what you are doing to yourself.

But you have to be willing to listen to the horse and you have to be willing to constantly examine yourself and ask, as Marcus Aurelius, "is this necessary?" Is what you are doing to protect your horse's health achieving that purpose or does it merely give you a little hit of dopamine from believing that you just did something "nice" for your horse?

Look closely at all of the things that you "worry" about with your horse. Unless you can demonstrate an ability to improve your horse's health through "worry" ask yourself  what good all that worry does. Responsible horse owners work hard to stay current on research that actually affects the horse's well being. Such horse owners make up a very small proportion of horse owners. Very small indeed. 

Most horse owners are happy to be able to recite rules about how old a horse should be before it takes a rider, or how much weight a horse can carry, or whether "turn out" is worth the risk of injury. One can do nothing but pity the plight of horses whose owners are perfectly happy remaining ignorant, as long as their ignorance conforms to the ignorance of all of  other proud members of the established horse world. 

Of all the people in the established horse world there are none more pitiful than the horsepochondriacs. They are obsessed with a fear of a health problem that must be determined, examined, treated, and medicated.  These treatments and medications often involve removing the horse from his band, isolating him, medicating him, keeping him from grass, and if stabled keeping him from sunlight.

Such people often view every behavioral and training problem as a medical problem. It is bizarre indeed to see so many answers on social media to those who are writing in with problems with their horses , only to be flooded with answers that first one needs to get the vet our to make sure that the horse does not have problem with ...blah ..blah ..blah

The irony could not be richer. A healthy horse remains healthy when living in his band, eating grasses, hay and forbs, taking in sunshine and most of all, being able to move. 

Does veterinary care have its place? Of course it does. We regularly have the vets out. Our horses get shots and receive very regular hoof care. But in between those visits we do not spend our time with the horses wringing our hands about what medicine, supplement, or thing that you heard about on social media we should give your horses. 

Instead we give them what they need--a forage based diet, intense physical affection, an opportunity to live in small bands with other horses, and heavy exercise. They spend no time in stables. They have positive human experiences. That means that they are exposed to people who have learned, or are learning, to understand the horse's mind. Most of all, it means that they are not exposed to human bullies or cowards. both ae devastating to the horse's ability to become secure and confident. 

Communicating Confidence: Handling the Terrified Wild Horse For The First Time

This wild BLM mustang arrived at the horse lot around nine am and here he is taking a saddle about eight hours later. He has been with us for five days and loves to be handled and brushed and has had his first rider set on the saddle.

Many people would think it better to "let him get used to his surroundings" and ignore him for a significant period of time before handling him. With some horses one must do that because they are simply too dangerous to handle. But that should not be the general practice.

He arrived terrified. If I had left him alone for a week or two there would be absolutely no reason for his fear of people to reduce. In fact, he would only have had a period of extended fear. 

Instead, we nearly immediately began giving him the most important thing that one can give a horse in training--positive human experiences. The experiences must be positive from the horse's point of view.

That means that he needs to be given the kind of emotional security that he would have in a wild band with a lead horse in charge of movement, speed and direction of  band members. He also needs the warmth of physical contact that he would receive in a band of horses.

When we say that we train with 51% control and 49% affection, this  is what we mean. One cannot beat a horse into feeling secure, but one also cannot simply hug a horse into feeling secure. 

And that one word is the key to making progress with a horse --"security". As a prey animal  a horse wants nothing more than to simply be safe and secure. 

And without feeling secure there is no way a horse can ever feel confident. 

Earning the Trust of a Wild BLM Mustang

One cannot teach what one does not know. One can not give away what one does not have. One who is without trust cannot teach a wild mustang to trust. And way too often one does not know what it is is that does  not know. 

For over seven years I have worked with those who are in the in patient PTSD program at our local Veterans Hospital.  The weekly programming that we did with the horses and our guests from the Veterans Hospital was deceptively simple--we brush horses and then we work them in the round pen. We explain how prey animals respond to various cues and situations and how that is precisely the same way that people who have been traumatized tend to respond. 

Participants learn self understanding, build self confidence, and work toward building trust in the animal with whom they are working. Like those who have been sufficiently traumatized, a horse seeks security as its primary emotional drive. 

And then we deal with the difficult issue of learning how to trust. 

This horse arrived at our horse lot from a BLM auction last Saturday. He was terrified and as wild as a deer. This picture was taken about thirty one hours later. Just before the picture was taken the horse stood peacefully as Curie mounted up on him. 

He had spent much of the day being patiently handled using techniques of natural horsemanship for much of the day. He is learning to trust people.

It is not an exaggeration to say that most of what I understand about myself I learned in the round pen. When one looks down at a silted in, undisturbed, mud puddle one cannot see anything that is under that silt. But when the water is whipped into a furious mix, leaves, twigs, and bark come up out of the silt and reveal themselves. For years I have looked into the silted puddle that was my core and could see nothing beneath the surface. But lately a storm has flooded that puddle and I see much that had sat silently under the mud. 

I realized that as well as I worked with terrified horses, I could do better if I could learn to trust. I came to realize that, though I defined the term very differently than do most people, I do not fully trust those of whom I care the most. I trust them to be honest with me, to care for me, to be reliable--to be everything that people normally think of as "trust worthy". 

It is just that  I do not trust them to live. 

Those who have been the closest to me all too often have died or moved on. On a certain level, since Lido died I have not really expected those in my life to be around over the long haul. In the big picture this chronic instability impacts most aspects of my life. In the smaller picture it radically impacts my effectiveness in training horses and teaching kids. 

Now that I I can see what is in the mud hole I am in a better position to filter out the parts of it that hurt. And that is what I shall work on doing. I expect that if I do find a solution I will find it in the round pen.

That is usually how such things work out. 

Here's What A Long Term Participant In our Home School Educational Program Has To Say About It

I get a lot of questions about the homeschool program so I asked one of my long time participants and helpers to write up her experiences with the home school program. She went from attending the home school program to becoming a solid rider, to becoming a very reliable horse trainer, all by the age of 14. Here is what she wrote about the program. 

 " Four years ago I came to the horse lot for the Friday program, expecting something quite boring and had no interest in horses

I quickly learned how to build a hugelkultur mound, run a horse in the round pen, put up a fence, run hot wire, shear a sheep, butcher a hog, how a worm farm made out of a hot tub works and to clear l acres of land without using heavy equipment. 

All things I thought I couldn’t do

Audrey and Matoaka, a horse born wild at Corolla that she trained. 

After a while a started riding and soon went on my first hard ride, then my first 50 mile ride and a 30 mile endurance race I doubted that I could do any of that but Friday’s taught me not to tell myself I couldn’t. 

 Audrey and some of the others  during a winter hog killing and processing of meat.

Audrey and a young Banker horse, one of the nearly extinct strains of  Colonial Spanish horses that we work to preserve and promote.

If you would like for your family to have the opportunities for growth and learning that Audrey has had send me an email at msindianhorses@aol.com. The cost of the program is $160.00 per family.

Mill Swamp Indian Horses is the program name of Gwaltney Frontier Farm. Inc, a 501 (c) 5 non-profit breed conservation program. We have no paid staff. Everything that we do gets done by volunteers.

So, while riding a horse for miles through the woods is great, I encourage anyone that gets the opportunity to drive out to the horse lot on a Friday morning to take that chance. Do everything you thought you couldn’t do and become a better rider and a better person.

This Fall Could Have Been a Dangerous Train Wreck

'Lot of jumpiness going on--a few unusual circumstances and then BAM! my horse blew up on me. I stayed on for quite awhile. I would have been able to bring her down with a one rein stop but doing so would have put us in some heavy brush. I came off and rolled when I landed. 

I got up bloody from some scratches but no broken bones and minimal bruising. Being able to roll as I landed kept the contact injuries to a bare minimum. 

Please do not misunderstand the purpose of this post. It is not to boast. It is to show adults what is possible. Had this happened a year ago my chances of a serious injury would have been much higher. Very much higher.

But I am not the same person that I was a year ago. Ketogenic and intermittent fasting have allowed me to loose over forty pounds.  We purchased a small sauna. It cost about $2,000.00. I researched sauna use and muscular endurance for weeks before we made the purchase. We purchased a 110 gallon horse trough and use it for daily ice baths. I made that move after learning about Wym Hof's work in temperature extremes.  It has been years since I regularly rode a bicycle and I have come to love each morning's ride.

The best exercise for riders is to ride and ride, and ride. However, pounding the heavy bag with well padded gloves does great things for one's core strength. Walking while pumping heavy hand held weights does the same. Rucking (my version is to walk with a book bag filled with weight plates) is doing more for my abdominal strength than anything that I have done in years. Throwing in a bit  of fast walking caps off the rotating series of exercises that I do during the week.

Might sound like a lot but it is only about two hours a day, including the sauna and ice bath. During the 1/2 hour in the sauna one can read or get other work done.

But none of this would be possible had I not gotten a cpap machine several years ago to make it possible to sleep all night. It would not be possible had I not gone to the Good Foot Store and gotten arch supports that took the agony out of walking. 

And this will be the hardest part of people to understand. It would not have been possible had I not bumped into the serious study of Stoicism. It has given me an ability to focus on real priorities--not socially imposed priorities--real priorities that are actually life and death issues. 

Now let's cut through the subtly---what is real is that I am 61 years old, still twenty pounds over weight,  was never a great rider or great athlete (my only real athletic ability is that, like many of my family members, I have always been significantly stronger than most of my peers) By all rights I should be typing this from a hospital. Instead I am sitting here with a bit of discomfort from a bee sting but no discomfort whatsoever from the fall from my horse.

And my point is... you can make huge changes in your life that will result in huge changes in your health. I cannot lift as much as I could forty years ago but I genuinely believe that I am healthier than I was when I was in my twenties. 

Check with your doctor and get approval first then...Get a sauna. Get an ice bath. Get some tennis shoes. Get a bicycle. get some hand held weights. Eventually get you a heavy bag. 

And your life, and especially your life with horses, can radically improve